Miles Robinson came into the Concacaf Gold Cup looking to boost his stock in the U.S. men’s national team depth chart at centerback, and the Atlanta United defender did just that on Sunday, with a standout performance that has propelled him up the list of top American defenders.
Robinson earned SBI Man of the Match honors after helping the USMNT defeat Canada, 1-0, to win Gold Cup Group B.
The 24-year-old was instrumental in helping the Americans post a shutout, stepping up after Walker Zimmerman was forced out due to injury, and as the rest of his teammates began to tire in the hot conditions at Children’s Mercy Park.
Robinson completed 93% of his passes and made five clearances, not giving Cyle Larin or Junior Hoilett a lot of room to operate. He also made eight recoveries and ultimately did not allow the Canadian attacking players to get a lot of time on the ball in the attacking zone.
Robinson’s best effort came in the final stages of the second half when he muscled Tajon Buchanan away from the ball in penalty area, winning the Americans a goal kick and sucking some life out of the Canadian players.
Now with two shutouts out of three matches, the USMNT will try to keep that run going in the knockout rounds of the Gold Cup.
Robinson beat out Shaq Moore, Sebastian Lletget and James Sands for Man of the Match honors.
What did you think of Robinson’s performance? Who was your pick for Man of the Match?
Share your thoughts below.
I think Vines deserves a little love. He had some good defensive inverventions and the few offensive opportunities in the second half went through his interplay with Hoppe. Also, the shine has come off of Busio. Canada made him look poor.
I think Vines was the American’s best player: lots of take aways, excellent passing, he had the fire Dike didn’t.
I thought that the only player other than Robinson and Sands who did well was Hoppe, but he played only 30 min and seemed to have trouble finding teammates with a pass. Today, he looked to be the only US player able to advance the ball on the dribble. You would expect more than one US player could dribble against Canada, sadly that did not seem to be the case. As a result Canada was able to get tight on the US players with little risk of getting beaten and limit the US ability to complete passes.
Let’s give it to Hoppe for creating more in ten minutes than our other forwards conjured all game.
Why is Lletget even up for honors? He did nothing in this game. That opening assist an after that he was all queit. I’m really disappointed in his play. He shouldn’t be on the WCQ team. Miles deserves it, he had his best game so far
SofaScore had Lleget as our 2nd best player. No idea how their algorithm works but he had 92% pass completions, 4/4 long ball accuracy, drew 3 fouls, 6/9 duals won, and of course the assist. Of course computers can’t always see whats going on Buchanan was rated Canada’s worst player, they had him 0/4 in dribbles attempted and 0/9 on duals so I’m guessing that’s why the low computer rating. Watching with your eyes he was the most dangerous player.
Totally agree with you on how was Lletget even mentioned as a top performer? His biggest contribution was his cross into the box, resulting in a goal. Dangerous cross either way but not sure it was intended for Moore?
Letget really was not up to the pace of the match. When the ball came to him he rarely took anyone on with the dribble or just took a dribble to fill space left by defenders and play a quick pass. Very disappointed with his performance and lack of leadership with trying to impose his play when the US needed it. However, his play very much provided who he is at this point in his career.